Kansas counties wrapping up Amendment 2 recount

LAWRENCE, Kan. (KCTV) -- The counties selected for the Amendment 2 recount are wrapping up their tallies.

Douglas County, which had approximately 47,000 total votes to go through, finished its count early Friday afternoon.

The original count put the tally at 38,718 NO votes and 8,716 YES votes.

After the recount, the election office reported 38,703 NO votes and 8,718 YES votes.

Jamie Shew, the Douglas County Clerk, explained the slim margin as a difference in the way humans and ballot scanners may interpret marks on a sheet of paper.

“The machine is very exacting,” Shew explained. “When humans see a line they may say ‘We see that as a mark,’ or ‘We don’t see that as a mark.’”

He and the election workers finalizing the count had worked long hours through the week. Vicki Hanes, a volunteer, joked that her thumbs were getting a workout.

“Hopefully this will assuage some fears about our elections that don’t need to be there and make people realize that, ‘okay this is good,’” Hanes said.

Shew admitted that he and other workers were feeling the strain of a long election season, but hoped the accuracy of the hand recount would affirm the validity of the voting process.

“This is a good opportunity, even though it’s tiring, to say there is integrity in what we do and the numbers match,” he said.

Johnson County, which had more than 250,000 votes to count, reported that its count was nearly complete. Fred Sherman, the county election commissioner, said he would announce the official count on Saturday morning.

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